Rating: 
Summary: The title is accurate!
Review: I thought I had read plenty of breastfeeding books by now, but for some reason when browsing the bookstore for another topic, I picked up this book and started leafing through it -- no doubt because of the rather arrogant title.I found it was everything it promised to be. I learned a lot about latching, medications, and came up with ideas for the sore nipples I was resigned to before I even brought the book home. If I were to start again, I'd buy this book and the Sears Breastfeeding book, and skip the others. Both are excellent references for problems you don't think you'll have until you're at your wit's end on a Saturday evening when there's no one to call. Dr. Newman seems to have a lot of practical experience with breastfeeding problems and presents many case examples along with good general instructions for solving problems.
Rating:
Summary: Great advice, very supportive of mom
Review: I wish I had read this before I started breast feeding and not when I ran into trouble. Newman is very very pro-breast feeding and doesn't see any good reasons not to for almost everyone. I suppose this could be off-putting, but please, science and common sense tell us that breast is best. Very few women have biological problems that make breast feeding impossible, they just end up in trouble because of the lack of support and understanding among so many doctors, nurses, and family members.
Despite the hard sell on breast feeding I think Dr. Newman is very supportive of women. This book discusses and debunks all kinds of myths about breast feeding - myths that can end up tying women in knots and making them worry about things they don't need to. For example, you can have a beer without pumping and dumping, most medications are fine, and you don't have to worry about giving your baby gas if you eat cabbage (or anything else). He also explains why breast feeding helps make the introduction of solid foods easier on baby, letting you relax about it and have fun giving your baby all kinds of new tastes.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't waste your time or money, worst book I have ever read!
Review: I wouldn't even give this book a star! I am fully supportive of breastfeeding and believe it is the best choice of feeding for babies. As I prepare for the birth of my first child I have read over 15 books on breastfeeding, pregnancy and birthing. This is by far the worst book I have spent my time reading. The tone of the author is not only annoying it is down right distracting. He is so focused on his agenda that it is hard to get past any helpful information he may have in the book. Dr. Newman style is to constantly put down others to make his case stronger. The sad thing is he wastes a lot of time pointing fingers and blaming others. If he had just stuck to the basics and removed the "attitude" it might have been better received. The layout is awful as well. I will not use it as a reference book at all, it answered very few questions. (So the title is misleading) I am telling anyone even interested in breastfeeding to avoid this book. There are too many other good books out there. The best thing I did with this book was throw it away.
Rating:
Summary: dr newman is one of a kind! book is an excellent resource!
Review: jack newman is one of a kind. he is a pediatrician who specializes in breastfeeding. he works 12+ hours a day at multiple breastfeeding clinics in toronto, answers phone calls and email questions from around the world (which he does not get paid for,) and lectures world wide about breastfeeding, its advantages and how to avoid pitfalls. my son and i became patients of dr. newman when i was having trouble with nursing my son. he taught me the importance of correct positioning and latch, as well as fixing breastfeeding problems, before they become serious. this book will help women to do that. i now provide breastfeeding support to other women, and regularly use this book to help me help others. all opinions aside about parenting, the science behind this book is helpful to me when i am helping others, and need to understand something in greater detail than some of the other books i have. i find the information on medications as they relate to mother's milk particularly helpful, as well as the information on positioning and latch. i find the diagrams and descriptions very clear and reccomend that fathers and other support people look at them and learn them to help support their nursing mothers. i believe that knowledge prior to birth would solve many of the situations that come up for breastfeeding women after birth. reading this book would certainly give a pregnant woman the resources to be able to position, latch and feed her child and the ability to trouble shoot when necessary. i like using this book in conjunction with the womanly art of breastfeeding, and dr. newmans article's. i am grateful that he does such incredible work, and that he is so freely giving of his time, knowledge and energy to help women achieve success in all aspects of nursing their children. he is truly one of a kind.
Rating:
Summary: I thought this book was horrible
Review: Keep in mind, I only got through the first 50 pages. Even so, the first 50 pages are a waste of ink. All they really need to write, in large bold capital letters, is "IF YOU ARE EVEN REMOTELY CONSIDERING NOT BREASTFEEDING, YOU ARE THE MOST HORRIBLE MOTHER EVER TO EXIST ON THIS PLANET AND YOU WILL SURELY BURN IN HELL FOR EVEN THINKING ABOUT NOT DOING IT"
I came in knowing I was going to do it, but the tone of the book TOTALLY offended me amd made me feel as if I was a small child being chastised by an angry parent. I could do less with the preaching about breastfeeding and more with the practical business of getting on with actually doing it. I KNOW it's best for the child, I don't need a book that beats me over the head with it -- I think that's called preaching to the choir, and it totally turned me off.
Rating:
Summary: Worthless. Go to a Lactation Consultant if you need help
Review: Money is better spent on a lactation consultant than a book!
Rating:
Summary: He's pro breast-milk and makes lots of sense!!
Review: My first round of breast-feeding was wraught with pain, turmoil and trauma. If only I had read this book then (Nov. '94) it would have helped immensely. Mothers planning to nurse are sabbotaged from the minute they enter the hospital. This book gives you more than a leg to stand on as you take on "the Hospital and staff", it gives you the support you need and the language (re: studies), to make your point. If you are looking to feel good about bottle feeding, you won't, unless, you are filling it with breastmilk and using it with a lactation aid to suppliment your own milk supply. I heartily agree with his politics and even his supposed preaching. We need more people willing to take a stand for ultimate health. By that I mean he wants to empower women (not to enslave them) And he questions the motivation of those who ignore empirical evidence to make a profit by marketing untruths. He cares about the phsyical cost to the child, and the country as we (the taxpayers and parents) pay for the treatment of avoidable and preventable health problems. Sometimes people are uncomfortable with those who up hold the truth and show us the rightness of things. This book does that. It is honest and amazing. If you want to find out why and how to breast feed, this is the book.
Rating:
Summary: Worthless advice -- go see a lactation consultant
Review: My wife and I struggled for six weeks with breastfeeding for our first child. We had lots of trouble with the baby latching on. We bought this book and another one and completely absorbed it and followed all their advice and it was of no help at all. In fact, it made it worse because it only enhanced our feeling of hopelessness. Most women would've given up but my wife persevered. In my opinion, the only way to solve your breastfeeding problems is to go see a professional. They don't charge much and you get a 100% customized plan for your personal set of problems. Every woman's body is different, every baby is different and every breastfeeding situation is different. In my opinion, no book with a generic, one-size- fits-all approach is going to work for everybody. However, beware that not all lactation consultants are the same. If you happen to live in the Washington DC area, one of the very best in this field is Josie at the Northern Virginia Lactation Consultants in Fairfax, VA. After struggling for six weeks with various books and consultants, we finally saw Josie and within two days all our problems were solved!
Rating: 
Summary: Somewhat helpful, but incomplete and oh so arrogant
Review: My wife was given this book to help her through the first weeks of nursing our second child. I did a considerable amount of reading the text aloud to my wife. At first we thought this was a great book. It talked in depth about a good latch and suggested a new position; these helped our daughter to nurse more easily. But when my wife ran into problems with engorgement, and when our daughter began nursing poorly on the left side, we felt worse and worse about this book. Now I have really begun to resent it. The most annoying problem with the book is its horribly imcomplete index. I wanted to find information about burping the baby. There's no entry for it in the index, but sure enough there's a strong opinion about it stated in the "Gas" section of the "Colic" chapter. (I stumbled onto it somehow.) Secondly, I find the text to be quite incomplete. For instance, there is no discussion of posture during nursing at all. This is a major issue for my wife, and seems to me a quite relevant one for any nursing mother. Also I think that the "ultimate" guide ought to give detailed diagrams of common nursing positions, and hints for how to manage the baby properly in those positions. This book contains no such information--only some random photos with captions (and again, no entries in the index--not even for "football hold"). The last issue I will mention: the author communicates an extreme arrogance throughout the text. He presumes that any problem a mother has with nursing comes down to one thing: the baby's latch. And it's clear that he feels that this is almost always the mother's fault. My wife needed encouragement; she was doing her best, she was engorged, and needed help to remedy the problem. This book merely served to tell her that she shouldn't have let the problem happen in the first place. Well, thanks. Surely there are less annoying, more complete, and more encouraging books on breastfeeding.
Rating:
Summary: A Must Have for Breastfeeding Moms
Review: This book contains all there is to know about breastfeeding and pumping. I bought this book while pregnant with my sixth child and after years of teaching childbirth education classes.. I still learned a lot! Buy it!
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